JUNEAU -- A joint effort between Alaska legislators and members of the public to find common ground on sustainable school funding is now being called biased and incompetently managed by one of its members.
The effort began with high hopes, as House Speaker Mike Chenault appointed the House Sustainable Education Task Force to begin looking at education funding solutions between legislative sessions. The task force was expected to provide an interim report and keep going until next year.
It was made up of the chairs of three legislative committees as well as five citizens appointed from the education and business worlds.
Now one of those business representatives, Anchorage Chamber of Commerce President Andrew Halcro, is leveling criticism at the task force and saying its work should not be used to justify lower school funding. The task force's problems began with the people who were appointed as its members, he said. Applicants were surveyed on their views on school funding beforehand.
"The makeup shows a clear indication that this was never an objective look at education," Halcro said.
The task force's formation was announced last April. Its first meeting was Aug. 28. A handful of additional meetings came before a Dec. 31 report saying that "Alaskans should be made aware that current education spending is not sustainable." Halcro said the task force decision-making process was flawed, and that five of the eight members had concluded the state was broke and couldn't afford more money for schools by the group's first meeting.
"To be very honest, the task force has been brutally mismanaged," he said.
Agendas for the meetings were provided three to four days before meetings, with little time to research the topics. It spent hours listening to sales pitches from different tech companies, he said. "The meetings were very poorly put together," Halcro said.
Task force co-chair Rep. Tammie Wilson, R-North Pole, said the task force did something unusual by actually traveling to hold hearings in places like Kotzebue to hear from local schools and parents, but that organizing meetings in the interim between legislative sessions was a time-consuming task that could have been done better.
The task force's recommendation of no new funding, issued at the first of the year, was called "disconnected from reality" by Ron Fuhrer, president of NEA-Alaska, and "stunningly underwhelming" by then-House Democratic leader Beth Kerttula.
Task force recommendations ignored
Halcro, in Juneau last week, joined the criticism, noting that when the legislative session began on Jan. 21, legislators seemed to have ignored the task force's recommendations. "Three weeks later, all these education proposals were introduced that would break the bank," he said. Halcro is a former two-term Republican state representative from Anchorage.
Legislative leaders say they're now reviewing some 60 education bills, many of which include new spending -- though a few do include potential savings.
Co-chair Wilson pointed out that it is only halfway through the task force's nearly two-year term, and it has not made any final recommendations yet.
While the task force has not recommended a level for ongoing school funding, that may be more the fault of the entire Legislature's failure over many years to determine an adequate level of funding.
"Until we know what we're funding, until we know what we're mandated to do, how can we put a dollar amount on it?" Wilson asked. "How can we say what is or is not enough?"
But Halcro questioned what could become of the committee's work if legislators ignored it.
"How can we say, 'We're going broke, we can't aid public education,' but now we can afford all of these additional programs, including vouchers?" Halcro asked.
Following the task force's initial conclusion that state education spending levels were not currently sustainable, Gov. Sean Parnell proposed an $85 per student increase in the base student allocation -- the amount of money given to school districts based on the number of students. More recently, Democrats in the Legislature countered with a proposal for a $404 base allocation increase. For the last four years the base student allocation has been $5,680, though school funding has increased in other areas.
Contact Pat Forgey at pat(at)alaskadispatch.com